Patricia

It was Father’s Day 2011, approximately 2 years after my father had passed away. I had planned to celebrate Father’s Day in memory of my father and my late brother-in-law, with my sister and their son.

Earlier that morning, I looked at the picture of my Father, and said aloud, ‘Happy Father’s Day dad, I miss you so much. I hope you show up today.’ I said that because there were other occasions since his passing, that he, beyond any shadow of a doubt made his presence known. We enjoyed our dinner at a fine restaurant and the day was passing by with no sign of my Father, or so I thought. On the drive home, my nephew wanted to stop at a convenience store to pick something up. I parked the car and decided to stretch my legs outside of the car.

While I was standing there, within five minutes or so, I saw my nephew walking towards me. All of a sudden, a light breeze touched my cheek and something red caught my eye. I looked down to see a red Poppy on top of my foot. Just as my nephew approached me, he saw it too. I had tears streaming down my cheeks. We both remembered that my father always wore a poppy on his jacket in honor of war veterans. We can only surmise that because there was no wind that day, except for when the poppy appeared on my shoe, it was my father acknowledging our love for him and letting us know he is still with us.